NAPA dismisses use of automated payment system for online copy

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The National Association of Press Agencies (NAPA) has dismissed the idea of an automated payment system to combat agency material being used without payment by online publishers.

Chris Johnson, vice chairman of NAPA, told Journalism.co.uk the concept of such a system had been a long term consideration of organisation but tracking written material from agencies online was too large a process to be fully automated.

"It's a questions of trailing the material: how do you get machines to register the element of a story that is from an agency and needs payment?" said Johnson.

"There would have to be human intervention and that puts an automated system out of the window."

Johnson added that tracking technology used by picture agencies was at a more developed stage but a similar process for text would not work because of the size and speed of distribution created by the internet.

He said that publishers acknowledged that material used in their online editions only should be paid for, but few had implemented a system to ensure such payment.

A primary cause of such infringements, he added, was a misconception among publishers that one fee would cover publication in both print and online.

"We don't accept that and we've had protracted correspondence with newspapers about it. As the web editions become more and more significant it becomes a more pressing issue," he said.

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